Soufflé.—Mix 3 oz. flour and 3 oz. butter smoothly over the fire, add 1 pint good milk, and stir till it boils and thickens. Pour half the sauce aside in a basin. To the half in the pan add a score of oysters, roughly chopped and bearded, ½ oz. butter, the liquor from the oysters, 1 dessertspoonful anchovy, the same, or a little more, lemon juice, a grain of Nepaul pepper, and a little salt. Mix all well together, stirring in the well-beaten yolks of 4 eggs; then add lightly the whites of 6 eggs, beaten to a stiff froth. Butter a plain tin mould, tie a band of buttered paper round it, and pour in the mixture which should little more than half fill it. Steam for 1½ hour, and serve very hot.
Steamed.—Lay them in a potato steamer over boiling water, cover with a plate to keep the steam in, and cook for 10 minutes. Then serve quickly in the shell, and on a very hot dish, with fried brown bread and lemon or vinegar.
Stewed.—Take 1 pint milk, thicken with 1 dessertspoonful of cornflour, and stir in 1 oz. butter; season well, add a dozen oysters, and stew gently for ½ hour. When serving, garnish the stew with sippets of bread soaked in lemon juice and fried in butter.
Toast.—Chop 20 oysters roughly, and mix with them 2 anchovies, washed and boned (paste or essence will do), mix well with a little cream or the yolk of an egg, and thicken with a little butter rolled in flour, and a grain of cayenne; boil up and serve on hot buttered toast.
Pilchard (Pie).—Cut the white part of 4 or 5 leeks into pieces, and scald them in boiling water with salt. Soak in water all night 3 or 4 slightly salted pilchards, clean them, and cut off the tails and fins, and put them in a pie-dish with the leeks in layers, seasoning to taste. Cover the pie with crust, and bake it in a moderate oven. In the country where this recipe comes from cream is cheap, and it is recommended to raise the crust, to pour off the gravy, and to add instead one cupful of hot cream just before serving.
Plaice (Plie).—Plaice have little to recommend them beyond their cheapness. There are two distinct kinds, those with the black backs being generally preferred to the spotted variety. The flesh of both is soft, and lacks the exquisite delicacy and firm springy texture of turbot and brill; but still, if stewed in the same manner as brill, they are fair eating. Fried plaice is a well-known article of commerce in the by-ways of London, where the operation of frying is successfully performed. The secret is that the fish are fried in good oil, and that the temperature is duly attended to. See Sole.
Perch (Perche).—Perch are delicate, especially when caught in a swiftly-running river, and may be eaten fried, or in water souchet, and shine especially in the latter form.
Clean the fish through as small an opening as is practicable, and lay them, without scaling, on a well-oiled gridiron on a brisk fire; keep turning them until you judge they are done, and send up to table with them, in a sauce boat, some liquefied butter, to which pepper, salt, and the juice of a lemon have been added. There should be one perch for each person. Stewed: see Carp, Trout.
Pike (Brochet).—When they exceed 4-5 lb. in weight, they are excessively coarse and hardly worth carriage, but those of small or moderate size are not to be despised when stuffed with a veal stuffing—into which a liberal supply of lemon peel has entered—and baked.
Baked with Sour Cream.—Cut the pike in neat slices. Place them in an earthen baking dish with some butter at the bottom; divide 2 bay leaves into pieces, and put them with slices of onion between the fish; strew with salt, and pour over ½ pint sour cream. Bake about 20 minutes in a quick oven, basting at intervals; then strew over some fine breadcrumbs and grated Parmesan cheese, bake a few minutes more till delicately coloured, dish without breaking the slices, but take away the bay leaf and onions. Pour enough broth or water into the baking dish to make a sauce; add pepper, salt, lemon juice, or vinegar; stir well round the crusting, and pour it over the fish.